November
6, 2012 is not only the date when Americans can remove the present occupant
of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, it is also the year when they can remove
23 Senators who now stand in the way of repealing Obamacare and making
substantial cuts in federal government spending and jurisdiction. That
date will be one of the most significant in American history, determining
whether our nation will reject or embrace the politics of ever increasing
government control. If the mid-term 2010 elections are indicative of
a fundamental realignment of the electorate, and I think they are, the
American people will reassert their rights to life, liberty, and property,
and will reject the politics of government control in favor of individual
freedom. Republicans need only gain 4 Senate seats to take control of
the Senate. The odds are, they will gain control of that chamber, even
if President Obama is re-elected.

If
Obama loses, Republican majorities in both houses will likely achieve
repeal of most, if not all, of Obamacare; will move to cut government
spending and programs; and will hold the line on taxes (if not reduce
them). If Obama wins, then a supermajority will be needed to override
his almost certain vetoes of those same measures. Therefore, Republican
control of the White House and Senate is essential to the movement for
individual sovereignty and for restoration of government as a servant,
rather than a master, of the people.

On
January 20, the Republican House acted boldly to prove its willingness
to follow the electorate’s lead. Sure, politics as usual still
reigns with duplicity as common now as it ever was.
The difference, however, is that members fear the electorate (as they
should), and the electorate demands elimination of the health care reform
law and dramatic cuts in government’s size, scope, and cost. Heeding
those demands, the Republican majority voted unanimously, 245 to 189,
to repeal Obamacare. Senator Harry Reid, the unanticipated victor in
his own hotly contested Senate re-election campaign, has announced that
he will block moves to bring the bill to a vote in the Senate and, even
if a vote is had, will assure that the Democratic majority prevents
passage of the bill.

On
January 20, the Republican House went beyond its move to repeal of Obamacare,
announcing plans to cut government spending by $2.5 trillion over the
next ten years: not enough by a long shot, but clearly a move in the
right direction. The cuts were meaningful, offering to eliminate Amtrak
subsidies and to cut funding for the Legal Services Corporation and
the National Endowment for the Arts, among others. Bills offering deeper
spending cuts have also been introduced by Republicans, including members
of the Republican Study Committee. While those bills also do not go
far enough, they are moves in the right direction.

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On
January 18, two hundred of the nation’s leading economists who
have served in Republican and Democratic administrations alike sent
a letter to House Speaker Boehner, House Minority Leader Pelosi, Senate
Majority Leader Reid, and Senate Minority Leader McConnell, demanding
repeal of Obamacare. They declared it “a threat to U.S. businesses”
that “will place a crushing debt burden on future generations
of Americans.” They informed the congressional leaders that the
law will establish a permanent barrier to job growth and will add “at
a minimum” $1 trillion to government spending over the next decade.
Among those signing the letter are many leading lights, including June
O’Neill (formerly of Clinton’s Council of Economic Advisors,
who was an outspoken critic of the health care reform law during congressional
debates); Arthur B. Laffer (whose famous Laffer curve served as an intellectual
explanation for how cutting marginal tax rates could actually increase
government revenues); and Larry Lindsey (former Federal Reserve Governor
who also has held many other prominent posts).

The
fate of the nation now hinges on popular sentiment. If the electorates
demand for restoration of individual sovereignty continues un-abated,
the political momentum will continue in the favor of further deconstruction
of the bureaucratic state and restoration of individual freedom, the
ship of state will move away from the perfect storm into which it is
now directly headed and toward less catastrophic waters. In the end,
however, sustained prosperity will only occur if we can go beyond reduction
in spending to deep cuts in the federal Leviathan, reducing its take
of the GDP from approximately 30% to no more than 10% and liberating
Americans from their current high tax and regulatory burdens. The Republican
House has taken meaningful steps in the right direction, but it is still
only proposing cuts in spending increases, not elimination of federal
jurisdiction and control over entire segments of the economy. Moreover,
we have yet to see proposals to restore the non-delegation doctrine
and the separation of powers by dethroning the bureaucratic state.

The
federal government may be likened to an obese man who has promised to
purchase enough ingestibles to achieve a daily intake of quadruple the
number of calories now consumed. The Republican Majority has proposed
a halving of the number of future calories, but that reduction if achieved
is not enough to eliminate obesity; indeed, even if future planned calories
are halved, the heavy federal man will still be more obese tomorrow
than he is today. We need a program of severe caloric restriction, beneath
that necessary to sustain obesity and equal to that necessary to restore
a healthy weight.

To
achieve meaningful and lasting reform of the federal government requires
an eternally vigilant electorate, one educated in the ideology of a
republic and committed to freedom from government restraint. The Tea
Party movement has brought America hope by proving itself indispensable
to the mid-term 2010 election results. In 2012 Americans must rise to
the occasion and remove from the White House and Senate those responsible
for the government takeover of all things private. If that objective
is achieved, the new majority must understand that it is not enough
to cut the increase in federal government growth.

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They
must substantially reduce the size and scope of the federal government,
restore the non-delegation doctrine by enacting Congressman Ron Paul’s
Congressional Responsibility and Accountability Act, and restore the
separation of powers so that the bureaucratic state no longer serves
as lawmaker, prosecutor, and judge—the very definition of tyranny.
Individual freedom must be the end, and all means necessary to achieve
that end must be promptly undertaken.

Jonathan
W. Emord is an attorney who practices constitutional and administrative
law before the federal courts and agencies. Congressman Ron Paul calls
Jonathan “a hero of the health freedom revolution” and says
“all freedom-loving Americans are in [his] debt . . . for his courtroom
[victories] on behalf of health freedom.” He has defeated the FDA
in federal court a remarkable seven times, six on First Amendment grounds,
and is the author of Amazon bestsellers The
Rise of Tyranny, and Global
Censorship of Health Information. For
more info visit Emord.com.

To achieve meaningful
and lasting reform of the federal government requires an eternally vigilant
electorate, one educated in the ideology of a republic and committed to
freedom from government restraint.